Monster
by Bluetory
Summary: When Anna is reaped for the 95th annual Hunger Games, she doubts she'll survive. But reaped with her is her childhood friend, Elias Lockhearst, a blacksmith's son, who has long since cut her out of his life. There is something peculiar about Elias – something he's hiding. But Elias is determined. He's going to get Anna through the Games, and out alive. Male Elsa; no-icest
1. The Reaping

Notes: I've changed a number of things in this crossover. This is a parallel universe to Panem. Instead of a coal mining district, there is instead, its replacement, the ice mining district. The geography might be a little off, as since Panem and the Capitol are based in futuristic US, there wouldn't be many frozen lakes (or even fjords – I'm continents off) these icemen could mine from. "Elsa" is her male counterpart, whom I've named Elias, and Elias and Anna are not related here.

I have taken the picture I'm using from Google, and I want to give credit, but I don't know the artist. If this is your work, and you would like me to credit you or remove it, please just send me a PM. I want to draw my own male Elsa some time, but I'm so unarty and lazy. D:

The title is my homage to the song of the same name by Imagine Dragons, which I believe has some relevance. :D Happy reading!

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**Chapter 1: The Reaping**

- may the odds be _ever_ in your favour -

_Born of cold and winter air  
and mountain rain combining.  
This icy force both foul and fair  
has a frozen heart worth mining._

I walk through the town centre, thick snow crunching satisfyingly beneath my feet. In my arms, I grasp the cloth wrapped food bundle I had picked up from the near-empty market. The loaves had been piping hot, fresh out of the oven when I had purchased them from the bakery only minutes before, but already, faced with the biting, bitter cold of District 12, they are cooling rapidly. I grimace and clutch the bundle tighter, attempting to fit them under my thick fur coat.

It is a bad fit, and for my efforts, I am rewarded with the painful sting of the cold air on my lower torso.

"Good morning, Miss Anna."

I look up, postponing my impossible task and smile widely at the district butcher, Jarvis, a balding, middle-aged man with sallow cheeks and tired eyes. He stands in the middle of the empty pig pen which is attached directly to the back of his house, looking a little awkward, lost and out of place.

He nods absently at me, his frayed working overall draped across his shoulder like a big, off-white cape. Even from this distance, I can see the washed out browns and reds from the cattle and sheep he'd butchered, embroidered across the cloth like a macabre pattern of flowers.

I remember being scared of the butcher when I was little, the murderer – the man with the blood stained clothes – before I was deemed old enough to be truly explained the nature of the Games. Then I just realised that he was just one of us. This kindly old man, with the generations old overalls, who had to cut and slice up pigs, sheep and cows to eke a meagre living.

"Good morning, Jarvis!" I call back, hoping he could hear me.

He pauses and steps closer to the fence, leaning on it, "Good day for a reaping." He says conversationally, nodding his head at the milky dawn sky. He catches my half-hearted smile and returns a rueful one. "On your way home?"

"Yes."

"Send my respects to your mother and father. How is the laundrette doing?"

"Well enough for me to buy this." I tell him, motioning at the loaves, and this time, he cracks a genuine smile.

"That's good to hear." He says, nodding. "That's always good to hear. Well. Best hurry along now, Miss Anna. And good luck for today."

We exchange farewells and I continue on my trek home.

_So cut through the heart, cold and clear.  
Strike for love and strike for fear.  
See the beauty, sharp and sheer split the ice apart  
and break the frozen heart__._

The district seems almost unnerving without the usual sound of workers returning home from a night shift on the fjords. It is customary for the icemen of the district to work primary during the night – when the air is coldest, and the ice on the surface of the fjords the thickest. During the early morning, the workers return to the district centre to stack and package the harvested ice onto large cargo carriages for transportation into the Capitol. They have the rest of the day off to return home to sleep and eat, and the process repeats again the following night. It's arduous work, and the pay is painfully low. But then, what other choice do we have?

I walk the beaten track used daily by the icemen and marvel at the thick layer of snow which has already mostly masked whatever heavy footprints there were before.

The workers are no doubt at home. Work is suspended on the day of the Reaping, and those with sons and daughters will be spending the hours with their families, likely fearfully, praying and bartering with whichever Gods they believe in to spare their children's lives for one more year. Others, ones who don't have any loved ones at risk, or ones who just simply do not care, will be treating this as a long-yearned-for one day holiday. One day, once, every year.

And that's pretty much life here in District 12 summed up. The District of icemen. We live for ice. Ice is our lifeblood – we harvest ice from the lakes and fjords which surround our district – ice which is cut with saws and handled with hooks and tongs and then painstakingly chipped and hacked into manageable sizes with the ice picks and adzes. The huge, dripping blocks are then transported to the Capitol for use as coolers for their food and perishables and for any other recreational whim of the Capitol.

_Ice has a magic,  
can't be controlled.  
Stronger than one, stronger than ten,  
stronger than a hundred men! Ha!_

I reach my neighbourhood, and the silence is absolute. The shutters and curtains (for those who could afford that kind of luxury) to every house are drawn tightly shut. There is a pensiveness in the air, and a sense of foreboding. The people of District 12 are not outgoing at best – the coldness of our environment has somewhat rubbed off on us – but today, everyone is keeping themselves strictly to themselves. There is a tension in the air which is building up, slowly, second by second. The Reaping starts at two.

I catch sight of my home. The faded words, _Arendelle_ _Laundrette_ are painted onto the worn board of the shop front. Father painted it himself, some forgotten memory, long ago, before the unrelenting fierceness of the fjords of District 12 had beaten whatever artistic creativity out of him. The words are painted pink, outlined in gold and set on a peeling green background. An intricate design of a castle sits behind the words, white with blue turrets. It's beautiful.

Father had stressed over the shop front sign for days, painting in every little detail, every little brick, "I'm painting this for my little princess, am I not? And royalty needs perfection." He had told me, eyes twinkling, when I asked him why.

My father didn't initially work in the ice business. My mother always worked for the family laundrette, as well as looking after the children of ice miners. My father was a craftsman, he carved beautiful instruments, furniture and sometimes sculptures out of wood, painted them, displayed them in the window of the laundrette, and sold them to those who could afford them, which wasn't many. Sometimes I caught him giving toys to the village children, much to my mother's half-hearted, but loving disapproval.

Then the demand for ice in the Capitol rose, and mother and father's jobs proved not enough to make ends meet. Father left his job as a crafter and painter and joined the icemen, and soon, my father stopped living with us, and was replaced by a despondent shell of a man, with perpetually tired, empty eyes. Like the others, he was taken slave to the fjords.

_And all for a few loaves of bread._

When I enter through the front door, the cool air sweeps in, setting the solitary wind chimes off. My mother has woken up, and from the looks of it, only recently.

"You didn't have a lie-in?" Mother smiles at me, tiredly, rubbing the remnants of sleep from her eyes.

"I thought we could eat something fresh today. For breakfast."

"My lovely daughter." She tells me, and takes me in a warm embrace. "Let's get you ready."

We go to my room, my mother sits me on a stool and brushes my hair out with a wide toothed wooden comb, which father had carved out by hand. In my hand, I hold a small mirror, which had been a gift to mother from the late wife of the district blacksmith. It's made out of hammered steel, and coated so it won't rust. Everything we own in our house has either been gifted to us, or hand crafted out of wood by my father. It sounds odd, but it doesn't look so odd. We wouldn't have been able to afford to buy anything else. He used different varieties of wood, whatever he could get his hands on at the time, from birch, mahogany, redwood, maple, plywood, to rare, expensive oak for the table.

Mother braids my orange hair into two long braids and fastens each with a dark green hairband.

"You have such lovely coloured hair." She tells me. I giggle compliantly, earning a happy laugh from her – my parents and neighbouring adults had consistently told me this with fondness, their enchantment concerning my brightly coloured hair and mysterious (and according to them, charming) blonde streak – and for the earlier years of my childhood, I believed their words to be true. But then school started, and the opposite was drummed into me.

I put on a beautiful emerald green dress with off-the-shoulder green sleeves. My reaping clothes. It has a dark green – almost black bodice, greenish gold lacing, and embellished on the front is rosemaling, a tradition that my mother's side of the family had carried along with her. My mother told me that she thinks, before Panem was formed, along with the Capitol, we were all from different parts of the world. She tells me that she think that we were from a place called Norway, which is where the rosemaling originated from. Personally, I've never heard of the place, and the name is absent from any of my school textbooks – I've checked.

The dress used to belong to mother – these are her old reaping clothes. In District 12, amongst the poorer civilians, practically everything is a hand-me-down.

"Finished." She tells me, standing up, and walking backwards to admire her work from a distance. "You look so beautiful."

"Like a princess." My dad has finally awoken, and he leans in the arched doorway from my parents' bedroom. He gives me a tired, beaten down smile and waves distractedly to the dining table. "Breakfast, anybody?"

_Born of cold and winter air  
and mountain rain combining.  
This icy force both foul and fair  
has a frozen heart worth mining._

We arrive a little late, and miss off the beginning of the mayor's speech. It's no large loss, as it's the exact same every year – the story of the Capitol and the forming of the Districts, as well as the creation of the Hunger Games. We join the crowds lining up just outside the overflowing town centre, and watch the Reaping on large screens as it's televised to the Capitol.

A number of Peacekeepers line the outskirts of the crowd, and our late coming catches the eye of one man, who saunters over and grips me roughly by the arm, narrowing his eyes.

"Name and age?"

"Ow, you're hurting-"

"_Name_ and _age_?"

"Anna Arendelle, I'm sixteen."

"Well, Miss _Arendelle_, don't you know the penalty for absence during a Reaping?"

"Yes, I do, and I'm sorry, but we didn't miss-"

My mother cuts in, apologetically. "Officer, _I'm_ so sorry, it's not my daughter's fault, we just left the house a little late, it's all on us – sir-"

"Save your breath."

I am dragged further into the crowd, and I find myself thrust into a roped area, filled with other sixteens from the District. A few of them spare me a glance, but most of them have their eyes plastered on the screen in front of us.

The cameras are currently focussed on Lumnia Marionette, Distrct 12's flashy new escort, with her upturned snakeskin lips, heavily made up yellow cat eyes and intricately threaded wine red hair, piled on the top of her head to imitate flowers. She's clad in thick, expensive looking furs, ones which I do not recognise. She's strange and freakish-looking, but honestly, so is every other escort in our district history. When she catches her own face on screen, she beams widely, oblivious to the gloomy atmosphere and gives a little wave.

The cameras then pan out to the entire stage, an old thing, held together by rusty nails and erected outside the foreboding Justice Building. On the stage, there are five chairs, four of them occupied – (the empty one belonging to the major), filled by Lumnia and District 12's three surviving victors, of which I only vaguely recognise one: the youngest, and most recent victor, Kristoff Bjorgman; a grim faced, blonde haired young man who had only been a year older than me in school. He was reaped for the 90th Hunger Games, aged thirteen, and won out of seemingly sheer luck.

The cameras pan in on his face fleetingly, and Kristoff's eyes briefly flicker upwards at the screens, before returning to the major who is finishing his speech.

"And now, let me introduce our District escort. This is her first year with us, and I hope it will become the first of many. Lumnia Marionette."

Lumnia splits a smile and practically bounces up to the podium. She shuts her eyes and breathes in, her eyes shifting almost hypnotically beneath her closed lids. "What a _pleasure_. What a – pleasure – it is to be here." She opens her eyes and stares, looking pleased at the perplexed crowd beneath her.

"They've sent their biggest nutter this time." Mutters somebody beside me.

"It's so _cold_, but I can tell I'm going to love it here. District 12. Lovely." She beams at us. "Now."

It's time for the drawing. Two large glass bowls sit at the very front of the stage, one for the boys and one for the girls, each filled to the brim with tiny paper slips, and each slip with a name carefully inscribed on it in tall, curly writing. Four of those slips belong to me.

Lumnia dips her hand into the first bowl, and I'm guessing it's the girls' bowl – it's always been customary this way – and twirls her fingers round and round, dragging out the process as long as she can. She reaches her hand right to the very bottom and finally, her fingers close on a single paper slip.

The entire crowd has gone silent, and I'm sure the pounding heartbeat I hear in my ear can't just be my own. It's too loud, too brash and too irregular. My mouth has gone dry and I tell myself that it can't be me. What's four out of thousands? Nothing. It's unlikely. But not impossible.

Somebody next to me is whispering something under their breath, almost unintelligibly, and all I can make out is, "No, no, no, _no_, _no_ –"

"Hah," she smiles widely at us, finally, holding the slip of paper up, in the air, sandwiched between her index and middle finger, "Lovely. Our female tribute will be –" she pauses, unfolding the slip and squinting at the words as though having some difficulty with the name. Her cat eyes catch a gleam from the recording lights of the cameras as her brow relaxes and she comes out with a smile that would make the Cheshire cat proud.

"Our female tribute will be – Anna Arendelle."


	2. Elias

**Chapter 2: Elias**

- may the odds be _ever _ in your favour -

The words don't hit home until my mother starts screaming. I know it's her because I hear my name being shouted again and again. "Anna! Anna! No, not _Anna!_"

My head whips around in the general direction of her voice, but there are too many people in the crowd. I think I start to say something in reply, on default, but before the sound leaves my lips, a heavy hand lands on my shoulder, and the Peacekeeper who had reprimanded me earlier appears and unhooks a part of the rope barrier.

"We haven't got all day."

Realisation hits me, cold. I stumble clumsily into the path, nearly losing my footing. So _clumsy._ Nobody laughs, but I feel my face turning red. _Great first impression to the Capitol_. I think furiously, _I can't even put one foot in front of the other. How am I going to survive in the arena?_

"_Anna!_ Don't take my daughter from me!" It's my father's voice, this time. I swivel round to see my father, who has somehow pushed his way to the very sides of the crowd. He reaches out to me, but he's restrained by a grim-faced Peacekeeper. "Anna!" he repeats, urgently, desperately.

I reach back and nearly grasp his hand, but he's ripped away from me, and I hear muffled cries as he's pulled back through the crowd.

"No. No, _no_!" I run to where he had been standing, but Peacekeepers, who have seemingly appeared out of nowhere, bar the way. "Let _go_ of my dad!"

"Move on!"

I stumble backwards. I can feel the sob rising in my throat, and the sudden, breath-taking _panic_, but I choke it down. I'm being televised right now.

People are pressed away from me like I have some kind of disease, and I know their faces must have some kind of pity for me, but don't want their pity. I concentrate on facing forward, on placing one foot steadily in front of the other, on keeping a straight face. I can see my rapid breath forming in front of me in tiny clouds in the cold air. I try to even out my breathing. _Inhale-2-3-exhale-2-3-inhale-2- _

I feel dizzy, sick, like I have a fever or a flu, and my mouth is dry. I suddenly get the urge to run, but I console myself. This is on every screen in Panem and the Capitol. At the moment, everyone's eyes must be plastered to their screens. District 12 is probably the most heavily watched place in Panem right now. And I can't outrun any of the Peacekeepers. I can't._ I can't_, I tell myself. _And even if I could, where could I run to?_

"That's it. Lovely. Don't be scared, little Anna." Lumnia says into the microphone, putting on what she probably considers an encouraging voice. In that moment, I think I hate her, even though I know none of this is her fault.

"Volunteers?" Lumnia adds cheerily, and is met by uncomfortable silence. I didn't expect anything different. "Not that type of District? Oh well, you can't have everything."

She watches me with her yellow eyes as I make my way up to the stage. The floor creaks and I feel as though the entire stage is going to just collapse under my weight and swallow me up. Perhaps it would even be better that way. I stare at the crowds upon crowds of people before me, and the sick feeling in my stomach rises up once more. I catch sight of my own face on the screens. I look as pale as a ghost, and absolutely terrified.

"Lovely." Lumnia repeats, smiling at me and extending an arm as though in welcome. She's even scarier-looking up close and I can see the light dusting of powder on her nose. "How touching. However, the show must go on; and _on_ it will _go_. Boys."

She drops her proffered hand into the second glass bowl, and once again, her fingers close on a second paper slip. She lifts up the piece and deftly unfolds it with one hand.

"Marco Hewitt." Lumnia calls out.

Heads turn as a muffled wailing is heard. It's a young boy, a head full of unruly, mousy brown hair and a face that has yet to lose the last of its baby fat. I recognise Marco. He used to come to my mother sometimes, when both his parents were busy at work. Not willingly, though. His parents had to drag him there. I remember once, when he snapped at mother that he was _already _eight_ –_ and he didn't need a _babysitter_. A typical boy. He thinks he's tough. Not now.

"This can't be happening. Please. Please. Somebody. Help." Marco begins to claw at the people surrounding him, who are swiftly backing away from him. He looks half crazed, and I find myself wondering if I looked like that. "I can't die. I don't want to die."

Somebody, another young man next to Marco, shrugs off his offending hands. "_Nobody_ wants to die." He snaps.

"But – I, I can't, somebody, you've got to listen – not me – I can't, _please_-"

The cameras are all panned in on the scene now. No doubt it is making for good viewing in the Capitol. Every eye must be plastered to their screens. _Tribute Drama in District 12_. No doubt, it'll make headlines in the Capitol tomorrow. It happens every year, granted, but they always – _always – _manage to make something out of it.

The Peacekeepers are already making their way towards the thrashing boy, pushing through the crowd, and the crowd shies away from them – nobody wants any trouble – nobody _ever_ wants any trouble. They're still tense, but I can feel and see the relief written across their faces – they've already gotten out of the worst of it.

Marco Hewitt starts screaming at this point. He clutches his hair like a madman, and next to me, Lumnia tuts quietly and shakes her head. I think maybe he's about to fall, when suddenly another figure slides into view of the screens and clamps a hand onto Marco's arm. The crowd hushes, and the cameras pan closer and closer.

"I volunteer in the place of Marco. I'll volunteer. As tribute." His voice is crisp and clear and it resonates throughout the town square. There is a collective intake of breath and suddenly, everyone starts to whisper amongst themselves.

"Eli? I, Eli, how -"

"Marco, calm down. I'll take care of it, alright?"

"How exciting!" Lumnia's slitted, golden eyes widen in excitement and she claps her hands together. "I can tell I'm just going to _love_ this years' tributes. Come right up… what's the name?"

There is a glint of recognition in the face of one of the older Victors. "Young Elias Lockhearst." His eyes dart coldly over at Lumnia's garish grin. "Aye, Bill's son."

"Come right up, Elias Lockhearst!" She pronounces his name a little oddly, stressing the "_hearst"_ with her ridiculous Capital accent.

Elias Lockhearst is the son of one of the district blacksmiths, and arguably the best. He is tall, built and handsome, with light hair which is more white than blonde, and an unreadable expression on his face. His dark eyebrows, barely concealed under thick tresses of pale blonde hair, are knitted together as he slowly, but steadily walks to the stage, flanked on either side by Peacekeepers and a thousand times calmer than I ever was. His expression soon turns into a stony one, and he climbs up the wooden steps and stands up on the podium, next to me.

My stomach sinks. I know Elias Lockhearst. And I know he knows me. We share a history, but I am sure he hates me, although I cannot remember what I did to deserve his hate.

I hear a gruff cough behind us, and then the mayor begins to read from the Treaty of Treason, in a tired, weary sounding baritone, and I try to listen, but I simply can't concentrate. I sneak a sideways glance at Elias, but he's staring stormily at the crowd, seemingly lost in his own thoughts, a slight crease forming in his brow.

Elias looks deeply troubled, and I realise that he must be thinking about his family. I scan the crowd for his parents, and I realise that mother would not be in the crowd. Attending the Reaping is compulsory, unless you are on your deathbed, and Elias's mother may as well be. Suddenly, I catch sight of my own parents, a speck of sand in a desert, and I have to look away as a lump forms in my throat.

I admire his bravery which allowed him to stand up in the place of Marco. I don't know the relationship Elias and Marco share very well, but I know that it's not uncommon for siblings to turn their backs on each other when the Reaping came round. I wonder if what Elias has done was purely out of bravery. Because the only other reason would be complete insanity.

Then I begin to wonder if he _is _insane, choosing Marco over the life of his mother? I distantly remember my mother talking about Mrs Lockhearst, sounding completely distraught. She was bedridden and unwell, and had been for the last couple of years, ever since the death of her sister. I imagine Elias's struggle, leaving behind the responsibility to care for his sick mother solely onto his father's shoulders. I imagine the pain that would cause his mother, being presented with her son's death sentence. Because that's what being Tribute isn't it? It's a death sentence.

But Elias must already know this.

I stare at him, and I find myself wishing I could somehow console him right here and now, and tell him that everything is going to be okay, even though that might not be true, and –

And then, unexpectedly, he stares back, his eyes a startling cornflower blue against soft fair hair, making my heart leap inexplicably. A strand of hair has fallen over one eye and I feel the sudden urge to brush it out of the way with my hand.

"-hands." Agrees the mayor.

I blink. What?

"Miss Arendelle?"

Suddenly, I realise that the mayor has finished reading the Treaty. He stares at me expectantly, and I notice Elias's proffered hand. He raises his eyebrows.

"Excuse me, Miss Arendelle? I don't wish to ask again, but would you _please_ shake hands with your fellow tribute to seal the Treaty?"

I feel a deep, horrifying blush rise in my cheeks and I roughly grab his hand, pumping it up and down forcefully. "Sorry! I didn't realise. I was staring." I catch myself, suddenly mortified. "Not! Not staring! I was definitely _not_ staring, sorry for not staring! I was just looking – admiring – not admiring you, not that I _wouldn't_ want to admire you – you're gorg– that's awkward – not that you're awkward, I'm awkward – uh, actually forget that, pleasure to serve alongside you, Eli – I mean Elias."

I soon realise that it was perhaps not the correct thing to say, and silence probably would have sufficed, with other benefits including making me look like a less severe dork. I drop Elias's hand like a hot coal, and but he just holds it there, looking nonplussed. The mayor looks distantly surprised and Lumnia's expression is of either delight or complete distress, and I'm not sure which one I entirely prefer. The crowd seems equally confused, and my thoughts revert back to the viewers in the Capitol.

At this point, I am sure I have made a complete fool of myself, and the hotness in my cheeks is threatening to burn, until Elias finally cracks a small smile in return. His eyes light up, and I feel a sudden sense of nostalgia. "Likewise, Anna." He tells me.

_You haven't changed one bit._

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**A/N**

**I'm not entirely satisfied with how some parts of this chapter have been written, so I'll be going back to do some editing in the future.**

**Anyway, I won't be updating for a while, as I am off to the Lake District to do my practice Gold DofE Expedition. I'll continue if I return alive! Review if you like the story, I LOVE reading all of your reviews and I try to reply to them all personally!**


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